Inside this issue
Disaster Management
Flood Hazard Mapping is an appropriate land use planning tool for flood prone areas as it creates easily read, rapidly accessible mechanisms which facilitate planners identify risk areas and prioritise their response efforts.
Wildlife Woes
In the winter of 2007 and 2008, more than a hundred sub adult and adult gharial mysteriously succumbed in the Chambal River, unable to haul themselves out on the sand banks as temperatures fell below freezing. Chilled into immobility the gharial simply drowned.
Orissa has an estimated 1,800 elephants, but its shrinking habitat forces the animal to forage into humanscape often coming in conflict with man. At least 151 elephants were poached in the State between 1991 and 2001, while another 125 died of natural reasons or epidemics.
Rainfall Review
The term monsoon is customarily used in the South Asian context to refer to a period of widespread rains during June - September, otherwise known as the ‘Indian summer monsoon’. The common reference to a ‘good’ or ‘bad’ monsoon denotes whether the rainfall is in excess or deficit over a large area like India. While the monsoon has a wider economic and socio cultural importance for South Asia, its origins have been subject to much scientific debate.
Environment Solutions
Joint Forest Management (JFM), the cornerstone of forest management in India since 1990, is facing new challenges to provide an innovative approach coupled with timely fund dissemination for effective community participation.
Survey of India
The Geodetic and Research Branch of Survey of India has a long history of over 130 years, since 1877, of maintaining tidal data generated from the tide gauge network along the Indian coast and islands. This data is being used by 30 Indian and 14 foreign ports for subsequent processing and analysis for various purposes.
Cover story
The village of Isapur Sarki, home to 140 Hindu families, boasts of painted pucca houses and brick laid roads – a veritable picture of a prosperous Indian village. About 50 per cent of the farmers have a holding size of 5 to 7 acres and between them own about 30 tractors and 22 motorcycles. With no landlessness in the village, the poorer section too is able to afford basic amenities and own cycles and bullock drawn carts for transportation. Yet, they are a dissatisfied lot.
The Chitrakot boasts of delightful year round cascades, rising to a muddy monsoon crescendo as the waters tumble over a craggy arc. A little beyond are the romantic Tirathgarh falls that surge down forested tracts in a translucent gush of foaming waters.
Cyclone forecast
The extensive coastal belts of India are exposed to cyclonic storms, which originate in Bay of Bengal and Arabian Sea every year and are accompanied with very heavy to extremely heavy rain, gales and storm surges, causing loss of human lives and property. An early warning system is vital to manage a cyclone and minimise damage. India Meteorological Department (IMD) is the nodal agency to issue warnings and advisories to different agencies. In addition, it works as a Regional Specialised Meteorological Centre (RSMC) for tropical cyclones over north Indian Ocean and issues advisories to the member countries of World Meteorological Organisation’s (WMO) Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) Panel on Tropical Cyclones viz, Bangladesh, Maldives, Myanmar, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Sultanate of Oman and Thailand.
Traditional knowhow
Even thirty years ago the staple food in Yavatmal, Maharashtra was not grains but vegetables. The complete resurrection of lost wild vegetables is perhaps not possible, but documenting traditional knowhow and reintroducing them into daily meals will help build healthier generations.
Bedni Bugyal is one of the larger meadows in Uttarakhand and is also a way station on the Nanda Raj Jatra, a ritual procession held every twelve years. Further ahead is the snow bound trail to Roop Kund.
I was looking for a break from my typical Mumbai schedule and was for a while nursing a deep longing to visit the Nilgiris, having heard so much about its mysterious beauty and sparkling waterfalls. Sharing my views, I found a mate in my husband, who not only agreed but booked an expedition for the very next day.
Agriculture
On an average an increase of 25 per cent in productivity and 40 per cent in profit have been noted for the farmers who have opted for contract farming. The contracting companies too are finding it lucrative to make huge investments in advanced technologies and inputs. The success of such operations in the field can be gauged from the fact that over 150 seed production companies are vying for business with the contracting companies.
Opinion
Speaking on the occasion of World Population Day, Secretary General of the United Nations, Mr Ban Ki Moon, focused on the critical importance of family planning in developing countries if we are to successfully achieve the Millennium Development Goals within the stipulated time period.
In brief
The monsoon is wonderful this year, especially in Delhi. The city has turned green and resplendent. Recently, surveying changing consumption patterns of Isapur Sarki, a tiny village in the innards on Uttar Pradesh, I saw how intimately monsoon caresses the bare earth. Every dry patch sprung the brig
